towerofanimus | [open] oh lord, in the darkness

Entry tags:

[open] oh lord, in the darkness - lead me on my way

Characters: Daniel and you.
Setting: Dormitory 3-18, Floors 1 and 3. (Final prompt takes place at night!)
Format: Starting with action, I'll match.
Summary: Daniel wakes up, wanders around, and is generally put through the wringer.
Warnings: Spoilers for Amnesia; the Dark Descent, possible disturbing imagery.

[DORMITORY 3-18: When Daniel comes to upon his new dormitory bed rather than the cold, dusty stones of Brennenburg's prison, his exhausted mind lurches off the edge of rational thought and into bleak despair. He immediately believes that he's perished in the elevator crash, falling victim to the Shadow at last. A sense of failure pervades every weary inch of him, momentarily overwhelming the selfish relief that all terror and unease is now at an end. But of course, Daniel isn't that fortunate. The proof of his continued existence - the pounding of his heartbeat, his ragged breathing - pull him back to reality with rough fingers. He sits up and warily takes in his surroundings.

There's the instinctive, self-comforting urge to take out his lantern, even though the room is plenty bright already, but it's nowhere to be found.]

What...?

[Soft, incredulous words; this isn't the castle, isn't anywhere Daniel can recall ever visiting before. (Not like that means much, is the rueful thought that comes a moment later.) And when he gets around to reading the first of the letters set out for every new arrival, his mind reels yet again: his world, destroyed? Everyone and everything in it reduced to ash, to nothing, consumed by oblivion? The letter falls from nerveless hands as Daniel struggles to understand....and in this stunned and silent moment, some of the clouds that have filled his mind disperse. He remembers Hazel - sweet, sickly Hazel, his younger sister. How they both cowered under the shadow of their abusive father, how he would read stories to her as if doing so could keep her alive. How could Hazel just.....be gone?

For a short, merciful span of time, everything else flies out of Daniel's head. He buries his face in grimy, aching hands, and cries.]

[FLOOR ONE: Eventually, sorrow gives way to a gnawing and ravenous hunger, and Daniel stumbles his way to the cafeteria. He mulls over the contents of the other, second letter he had received as he goes, the fingers of one hand lightly toying with the orange collar encircling his neck. So, he was expected to survive here? With others? It's a prospect that seems so alien, utterly impossible....but he had found his journal and lantern in the chest by his bed, among other things, and they had brought him comfort in their familiarity. Perhaps this....situation, such as it was, could be dealt with, step by step.

His movements are slow and skittish when he eases into a seat with a platter of food (he had refused the oatmeal provided, wanting something more flavorful for his first meal after countless brushes with horror and death), and fear still smolders dully in his eyes as he glances around, but Daniel feels....a little better, despite everything. He can't bring himself to dwell on the idea of his entire world being brought to ruin, so he will focus instead on the here and now. And the here and now (for the moment) doesn't seem nearly as awful as the dark depths of Castle Brennenburg. There's people here, and no Shadow to haunt him. Maybe things will turn out all right....!

Daniel entertains this delusion right up until the moment that his stomach violently rejects the food he's just swallowed, and he vomits messily all over the table.]

[FLOOR THREE: Daniel is a curious man, even when he ought not to be. After filling his stomach (eventually, anyway, damn that oatmeal) and adjusting, however cautiously, to his new predicament, he sets out to explore what he can of the Tower. He reasons with himself that this is a sensible thing to do, and feels a certain rush of validation when he comes across the library that houses the network terminals. Not that he chooses to fiddle with those just yet - no, instead he's drawn to the shelves and stacks of books. He had been something of an aspiring scholar back home, after all, and a thirst for knowledge is a part of him that not even an amnesia potion could wipe away. So it's perhaps inevitable that Daniel sets to work reading everything he can get his hands on, curled up in a quiet and secluded corner away from all eyes.

...but then time slips away from him, and night has fallen when Daniel finally shakes himself free of the library's grip. Darkness surrounds him, presses in, and it triggers a burst of white-hot panic and fear. He shrieks, whipping out a tinderbox from his pocket to light the nearest candle. But this isn't Brennenburg....there are no candles, and instead Daniel fumbles the tinderbox, dropping it and setting his trousers on fire. He runs out of the library in a blind, screaming panic, torn between slapping the flames out of existence and letting them continue to scorch his pants in return for lighting the way down the corridor.]

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[For once, chaos had trouble sleeping, so he had chosen to take a walk around the Tower in order to lose some energy and be able to sleep. However, when he saw a person running down the stairs with their pants on fire. Quickly, chaos summoned a large ball of ice in his hands and spoke to the person. If they didn't do something soon..]

Please, stop running for a moment! I shall help you!

*Enoch has taken to sleeping late. This does not mean he sleeps deeper; the sound of someone crying rouses him, and for a moment, he blinks at the unfamiliar person on what was once Gamzee's bed.

The realizations strike at once: the poor child was gone...but this man needs someone to comfort him now. The bed across the room from him creaks and sandaled feet hit the floor. Enoch runs a hand through his hair to set it back to its usual state and approaches his new roommate to put a hand on his shoulder. Nothing threatening here, just a man in jeans and sandals. Well, there was the white thing with a blue glowing beam still propped against his nightstand but that was back there.*

[That was absolutely disgusting. Of all the times to be thankful that he couldn't see, now was one of them. Though the smell and sound were literally the worst parts of the entire thing in general.

Satsujinki covered his mouth as if trying to keep himself from suffering the same fate. But he was done eating his own food, no matter how good it tasted preciously.]

...nice one. Think you could do that a little louder?

[Oh, good thing he managed to turn away, or else he would have hurled all over this passing girl's shoes... to her credit, she doesn't really look annoyed, only mildly grossed out. But that's a given. Most people would look like that after watching someone vomit up their breakfast.]

... You must be new here.

[ He hates to admit it, but it still troubles Archer to hear people cry. It troubles him to pass by this room on the way back to his own (rarely used) room and hear the wrenching sounds of sobbing.

He pauses by the door. ]

Jeez. Cry more softly. There are other people in this tower, you know.

[In moments like this, Daniel can't hear a thing through the fog of panic and sheer, unfiltered terror that descends upon him. To hesitate in any respect, whether to deliberate a thought or slow his pace, would only led to death - this is the lesson that had been imprinted upon his brain with bruising strength. All he could do was plunge forward into the darkness and desperately pray for some kind of escape.

He would have kept running (screaming all the way, his trousers turning to cinders) if it wasn't for the stairs. More specifically, if it wasn't for the way Daniel trips and crashes down the remaining steps head over heels to land in a groaning, pathetic pile of limbs.]

[It takes Daniel a few minutes to realize he had been addressed, let alone formulate a response; he looks as though someone has clonked him over the head. The reaction had been so sudden, so ruthless and painful, that it's left him breathless in the worst of ways. And even beyond that, Daniel can't quite remember the last time he heard a voice that wasn't his own, or dim echoes of screams and conversations long since over.]

M-My apologies, I- [his voice is hoarse, as if from either strain or disuse, and he swallows thickly (hating the lingering taste of bile) before trying again.] I didn't..... [a pause that stretches a little too long, and then he finishes lamely:] ...think that would happen.

[His cheeks flush with dull embarrassment. Daniel fumbles around and starts cleaning up his mess.]

[A woman with pale, silvery hair and bright, red eyes is sitting nearby--thankfully, out of reach of his vomit. She's sipping tea she had made herself with some of the green tea she had obtained from the Tower's admins, and blinking in surprise. However, she'll stand and set her tea down before making her way over, setting a hand on his back.]

No amount of stubbornness will reward you with this.

[Quickly, chaos followed the person, and when he fell to the ground, chaos melted the ice, turning it into water, and putting out the flames in Daniel's pants. However, this now meant that he had wet pants. In another instant, chaos put a hand on Daniel's back and healed him of any bruises or cuts he might have gotten.]

Are you alright now?

[..For a final measure, chaos dried Daniel's pants before the boy could reply.]

[Daniel's world is a carousel of nausea and misery: his guts clench and unclench in a sick rhythm, his head swims as the urge to empty his stomach swells again. But there's nothing to vomit up this time, so instead Daniel dry heaves and coughs. He jumps under her touch - a sharp, intense cringing, as though she had instead struck him with the intent to harm - and swivels his head to stare up at her with wide eyes full of confusion and fear. His world of no more than a day ago was defined by fear, carved into dimensions with cruel and deep strokes, and so the instincts that belong to such a world are lightning-quick to reassert themselves.

But he manages to calm himself almost as quickly, and his first muddled thought is that this woman is quite pretty for someone with such strange eyes. Daniel opens his mouth to say something....perhaps to explain himself, or apologize for his rather disgusting mess. But all that comes out is a single clumsy, lightly accented word.]

Wh...what?

[He coughs and sputters, holding his sides as a sharp agony assaults his intestines. His throat burns with bile, and tears prick the corners of his eyes from the discomfort pressing in from what feels like every conceivable angle. It hurts, it hurts and it's shameful, and some part of Daniel feels anger beneath it all at the dim sensation of being cheated. All he wanted was something to eat, in a place without the Shadow or horrible, lumbering monstrosities intent on tearing him apart.

It hurts to swallow hard, but Daniel manages it, bringing himself back under some semblance of control before looking over at Hakuno.]

I...[It's at this moment that Daniel regains enough presence of mind to fumble for napkins, and he wipes his face before continuing.]...y-yes, I suppose I am. Just woke up here a short while ago, but...what do you mean by that?

[His voice is quiet, softly British, as he regards her - this unfamiliar girl with mild disgust written plain as day across her features. Exhaustion is etched deeply upon his own face, puzzlement slightly less so. A pause, and Daniel glances warily at his plate.]

....is the food poisoned?

For some reason, we must all eat the oatmeal or nothing else will stay down. It is bland and tasteless, but merely an inconvenience and little more.

[she's not fazed at all. In fact, it may very well be that fear is such a natural response to her presence, it's entirely understandable.]

If you would like, I can fetch you some.

[Daniel is weeping into his hands with enough force to suggest that he was trying to empty himself of all the tears he would, could ever shed. It's not a pleasant sound - a wretched, despairing combination of choked sobs and congested sniffles. It's during a low point, an exhausted lull in his grief, that Archer speaks and so is heard. Daniel lifts his head enough to peek out at Archer through the cracks in his fingers.

It's an embarrassing sight even partially-eclipsed, Daniel's tear-streaked and blubbering face, perhaps almost as embarrassing as the extremely stupid question that falls out of his mouth a moment later.]

....there are?

[The expression quickly fades from the girl's face. Now that the shock of watching the poor guy lose the contents of his stomach wore off, she can be properly concerned. She sets her own plate down on the table, taking a seat nearby - directly opposite of the mess Daniel made, of course.]

No, it's not poisoned. [Though she wouldn't really put it past Jason, if this really is his month.] The administrators, the people who run the tower... they do something weird to us. When we first wake up in the tower, we can't eat anything other than oatmeal, or else we get sick. That's how I was able to tell that you were new.

It's weird. I know. I don't think many people try to question it.

Are you sick or something? [Wait, duh. He just got sick all over so he must have been sick to begin with.]

You shouldn't be going in public places if you're sick enough to puke all over. You'll probably get everyone else sick too. There's a medical area somewhere around here...

[Silence as her words reach him and are pondered. Daniel's eyebrows furrow as they draw together - you can practically see the cogwheels in his head spinning. He's honestly not a stupid man, but today has been assault after assault of things alien and strange, and it takes a few minutes for her response to sink in.]

I-I don't mean to....to bother you, madam. You don't need to trouble yourself on my account. [He stands up on shaky legs, then pauses. And as if from a great distance, the old knowledge of courtesy return to him in bits and pieces; she is a lady, and so must be treated with respect. That was the way of things in his time, something deeply impressed by the culture that had raised him. It was too late to avoid making himself look like a colossal fool, but...perhaps he could salvage some small shred of this encounter.

Daniel bows awkwardly at the waist, offers a weak and apologetic smile, before dropping to his knees to begin cleaning up his vomit.]

But I, ah, thank you for the advice....I had been provided with oatmeal earlier, you know, but turned it away. [A humorless, pained chuckle.] It seems like the unwise choice, in retrospect.

[His wary glance narrows into a confused, irritated squint; he regards his ruined plate as though it had personally insulted him. As his nausea thankfully subsides, Daniel clenches his jaw at the thought of such a cruel prank.]

That's a rather beastly thing to do. [And at those words, Daniel feels a twinge of guilt - but why? For what? He shakes his head as if to clear it, grimly setting about mopping up his vomit with more napkins.] Hmph, first I've heard of it....this whole situation is already quite insane, but surely some sort of warning wouldn't have gone amiss.

[A grumble, and then Daniel's shoulders go slack. He sighs.]

One of those letters told me I was saved, but what does any of this have to do with salvation?

[It's almost funny, like tragedies sometimes manage to be, that Daniel's fear of the dark doesn't stem from the mere absence of light. It's a deeper, more primal terror - the fear of being trapped forever, unable to escape or free himself. A claustrophobia to make him hallucinate and grind his teeth in a maddening cacophony of sound. Despair envelops him now with the same iron grip, suffocating and restrictive.

He flinches back from the warm pressure of a hand on his shoulder, jerks his head up. For a moment, Daniel can't breathe. Then his throat unlocks and he asks, hoarsely:]

Wh-Who are you? What...what do you want with me?

[His mind is still full of Hazel, eyes glassy with sorrow and unreality, painting threats where none exist.]

No, I'm not ill.

[Daniel begins his response as a protest, but it falters and dies, turning into something much more meek. He didn't have the energy to forcefully argue with anyone about anything, right now.]

I felt fine before I made the mistake of eating something, in fact.

[Irritation creeps into his tone - not with his conversation partner, but at his situation. It just wasn't fair.]

I see. Allergies then? You can make your own food here if you can find the ingredients.

[Entirely missing the point, unfortunately.]

Try not to force yourself to eat what you can't.

... It's actually pretty tame, compared to the other things they do to us. [Boy if this guy thinks making them eat oatmeal for their first meal is bad, she's gonna feel pretty bad for him once the time for the monthly experiment to roll around...]

Well... [She hesitates only for a moment, expression falling a bit.] The story is that the world - all our worlds, because all of us come from different versions of Earth or other places - was destroyed and the administrators brought us here to escape from that destruction. But I'm not sure if I really believe that... a lot of people don't.

[He blanches at that, feeling a dim despair - but no real surprise, if he was honest with himself - as the newborn delusion that he might be safe here falls down around his ears. No, safety remains a rare and temporary luxury for him, whether ensnared in the bowels of a Prussian castle or magicked away to a bizarre, enigmatic tower.

Daniel continues to clean as he thinks. For a man who hails from a time when candles brought light and warmth to homes, the concepts that Hakuno speaks so casually of are fantastical, impossible. But if his experiences with the Shadow have managed anything, it's the stripping away of conventional ways of thinking; Daniel has had to embrace the supernatural, so the idea of other worlds is no longer beyond his reach. In fact, it invites that ever familiar rush of curiosity....the desire to seek out answers and dismantle mysteries.]

Yes, I read about that part of it as well. Gave me a terrible shock, but I don't think I quite believe it either. [A rueful, tired smile as he remembers his crying fit from earlier. What an unmanly display of emotion! Ah, well...] Perhaps I simply don't wish to.

[On one hand, it would be a simple solution to a number of problems: Alexander would be dead, as his former self had wished. The Shadow would be gone as well, and with the destruction of the castle, Daniel would no longer be pressed to learn of the dark events that had conspired to result in him drinking an amnesia potion and calling for the death of an old man. But....it would also mean the loss of Hazel, of England, of so much else. He bites his lip for a moment, then attempts to change the subject by giving Hakuno a weak smile.]

If it's not too improper to ask, what's your world like?

[He almost says was but catches himself.]

[That causes her to laugh, just a little.] No, I don't think it's improper. From what I can tell, some of the places the people here come from are so wildly different, it's only natural to be curious.

[But... it's still hard explaining her own situation. How do you explain "I was stuck in a supercomputer on the moon with the digital spirit of a long-dead genderswapped Roman Emperor fighting mythological and historical figures for me" without sounding crazy?

... Maaaaybe she shouldn't. Not until this guy has more time to adjust to the strangeness of the tower.]

As for my world... I guess you can say it's not all that different from here. A lot tamer in some ways, but I was trapped in an area that consisted of nothing more than a school and a church.

[ That's easier for Archer to put up with than soft, quiet tears, at least. Mostly because it's easier to mock. No one ever said he was nice. ]

Yes, there are. I know you haven't noticed because you've been too busy trying to sob yourself to death. Incidentally, that won't do any good either.

[Alucard had been in the library, researching away as soon as darkness had fallen. Daylight was not a safe time for him, and so he slept until night had fallen. Lost in his own world, trying to understand what was going on in vain as he flipped through the books again and again. It wasn't until he heard screaming that he looked up, instinctively turning into his mist form.

It takes him a moment to realize what has happened, seeing the other figure on fire.]

Stop running! You need to douse the flames!

*The moment Daniel flinches away, Enoch immediately holds his hands up to gesture he means no harm.*

It's all right. My name is Enoch. I only heard you crying...I only wanted to help.

Another one?

[ A young voice speaks up from somewhere close to him, although he might not notice it first through his vommiting. When he does look up though, he'll find a young girl - probably about fourteen or so - in a schoolgirl outfit, her hands on her hips as she huffs a little bit. Not really angry or upset, but it's more almost as if she's offended by what he's doing here. ]

You people are going to bore all of us to death..! The first time it was funny when someone didn't know what they had to do and threw up, but by now it's not even interesting anymore..! [ What a sympathic young lady. ]

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[open] oh lord, in the darkness - lead me on my way

Third floor

3-18 Hello roomie!

Floor One

[Floor 1]

just outside room 3-18;

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Cafeteria

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Floor Three

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floor one